


Albus Dumbledore / Gellert Grindelwald oneshot collection

by Lillifred



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-21
Updated: 2015-06-21
Packaged: 2018-04-05 10:26:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 4,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4176375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lillifred/pseuds/Lillifred
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>a collection of drabbles and poetic oneshots, including poetry centering on Albus Dumbledore / Gellert Grindelwald</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 100-word-drabble 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've written these oneshots in 2007-2009 when I was 17 to 18 years old. Apparently that was my poetic-linguistic phase. Some of the stories mix German and English or are written in form of poems. Others are 100-word drabbles. I don't know if I will ever write something for this fandom again, but it is still dear to my heart, because this pairing was what made me write fanfic in English for the first time.
> 
> These have been posted to the Grindeldore community on livejournal.

“Avada Kedavra!”  
The spell missed Gellert only by one or two inches.  
„I hate you! I hate you!“  
“And why? Because you killed your own sister? I’ve got better reasons for hating.”  
Albus would many years later regret that he had never asked him about those reasons. Gellert was glad that Albus didn’t know.

Albus’ lips. Albus’ handwriting. Albus’ ears. Albus’ ideas. Albus’ thoughts. Albus’ skills. Albus’ friendship. Albus’ love. Albus.  
Albus, I hate you.

“If you use forbidden curses you have to really mean it”, Gellert said.

One second after he realized that Albus did mean it.


	2. GREATER GOOD

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is actually a 100-word-drabble. You'll find a translation of the German parts at the bottom.

GREATER GOOD

GELLERT

Don’t you miss  
Was einmal war?  
Your second kiss,  
Was noch geschah

Warum verleugnest du  
Your older, better parts?  
Ich blicke, schaue, sehe zu  
When your ending starts

Oh, Albus!  
Bedenkst du nicht,  
Dass deine Welt zerbricht?

Oh, Albus!  
If you only understood:

It was for the GREATER GOOD

 

ALBUS

You were near  
Die Welt war weit  
You were sincere  
Und ich bereit

It’s forbidden  
Und vorbei  
You are hidden  
Ich bin frei

Oh Gellert!  
Konnte ich verstehen,  
Was ich nicht hab gesehen?

Oh Gellert!  
If you only understood

What I meant by GREATER GOOD

 

 

Was einmal war? = What was once?  
Was noch geschah = What also happened?  
Warum verleugnest du = Why do you deny  
Ich blicke, schaue, sehe zu = I see, look, watch  
Bedenkst du nicht, = Don’t you think about  
Dass deine Welt zerbricht? = The breakdown of your world?  
Die Welt war weit = The world was wide  
Und ich bereit = And I was ready  
Und vorbei = And it’s over  
Ich bin frei = I am free  
Konnte ich verstehen, = Could I understand  
Was ich nicht hab gesehen? = What I haven’t seen


	3. Auburn Snow

Albus, you know so little.  
And I thought you would know so much.

Albus knows how Gellert smells and looks and tastes - in the summer. He knows how his hair looks - in the bright sunshine. Like bleached gold. He thinks he knows everything there is to know about the young man´s brightness and the young man´s magic.  
Albus is mistaken.

And Gellert is laughing.  
His laughter is shrill and malicious and sly and anything,  
anything but sane.

Gellert is laughing because he knows what a fool Albus is. Albus, who knows nothing about Gellert in the thunderstorm and nothing about Gellert in the snow.  
Albus doesn´t know that Gellert loves thunderstorms. Because thunderstorms are exciting and dangerous and deathly. He loves lightning, lightning is powerful. Very similar to magic.

Albus, you would be so glad.  
So glad, if you only could know,  
How beautiful I look in the snow.

And Gellert-in-the-snow is beautiful, very beautiful indeed. His fair hair is so full of tiny ice-crystals that it looks almost white. His eyes appear to be paler when usual, and also more concentrated, more watching when usual, and so full of glee. He is wearing a green coat, very noble, very handsome. His gentle, gentle hands are wrapped in white gloves. It´s Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve in 1898 when Gellert practices. Magic. He is a hard-working, praised student at least. He smiles at his classmate. Then he raises his wand.

Crucio!

It´s Christmas Eve again. It´s Christmas Eve in 1944. Gellert is celebrating in Nurmengard. He tortures his victims and kills them with delight. He is laughing manically. Because he knows that he knows more than Albus, and because his white gloves aren´t white anymore. They are full with dried, auburn blood.

Auburn like Albus´ hair.


	4. nightmare

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another 100-word drabble

Ariana´s dancing. Look at her dress! Look at her smile! See how the glee flies away with her fastening piouettes! See, how you can´t see: The Mania.  
Come Albus, join the dance, Albus, come! Life is worth living.  
Why don´t you dance, Albus, why? Is it your hurting old back?  
Now see! Whose hand is reaching out for a dance? The golden boy, the smirking!  
Look, Albus, look! Or are your eyes too tired, too old?  
Why don´t you dance, Albus, why? Is it your hurting old back?  
Or is it the boyish mask on the devil´s own face?


	5. Historians are Storytellers

Historians are storytellers,  
All they do is writing books.  
And their books tell us a story,  
All their books tell us the same:

They tell us about Gellert,  
Gellert Grindelwald.  
They tell us about evil  
How magic will defeat.

Don’ listen to the cunning,  
Don’t listen to the manifold,  
Don’t listen to the voices of malice!  
Don’t be naive!  
But be prepared!  
And don’t give in,  
And don’t give in  
To tyranny!

Historians are storytellers,  
All they do is writing books.  
Read their books,  
Believe their books.  
Cause what they write  
Is right.

But historians are humans  
And humans still are flawed.  
And therefore you will notice  
And therefore you will see:

There is another book,  
Quite old and also dusty,  
Quite shabby all in all.  
It isn’t full of wisdom (at least the adult sort)  
It isn’t there to teach (at least the adult reader),  
It is a children’s book.  
Given to a first-grade,  
Ambitious witty student  
It was read a thousand times

At least.

There is, indeed, another book:  
It tells a different tale.

Historians are storytellers,  
All they do is writing books.  
And their books tell us a story,  
All their books tell us the same:

They tell us about Gellert,  
Gellert Grindelwald.  
They tell us about evil  
How magic will defeat.

Historians are storytellers,  
All they do is writing books.  
Read their books,  
Believe their books.  
Cause what they write  
Is right.

But historians are humans  
And humans still are flawed.  
And therefore you will notice  
And therefore you will see:

There is another book,  
Quite old and also dusty,  
Quite shabby all in all.  
It isn’t full of wisdom  
It isn’t there to teach  
It is a notebook full of letters,  
Full of letters, full of Love.  
Written at dead of night and send  
To the most angelic beast  
It was read a thousand times

At least.

There is, indeed, another book:  
It tells a different tale.

Historians are storytellers,  
All they do is writing books.  
And their books tell us a story,  
All their books tell us the same:

They tell us about Gellert,  
Gellert Grindelwald.  
They tell us about evil  
How magic will defeat.

Historians are storytellers,  
All they do is writing books.  
Read their books,  
Believe their books.  
Cause what they write  
Is right.

But historians are humans  
And humans still are flawed.  
And therefore you will notice  
And therefore you will see:

There are so many books,  
Filling all the bookshelves  
For Gellert Grindelwald.  
For Gellert who has stolen  
Every single one of them.  
For Gellert who could murder  
A thousand righteous men,  
But couldn’t burn a single,  
Couldn’t burn a book.  
They were read a thousand times

At least.

 

There are so many books,  
Filling all the bookshelves  
For Albus Dumbledore.  
All of them are stolen  
From a thousand righteous men  
And from a lonely tyrant  
Who had murdered all of them.  
And although they are  
Quite old and also dusty,  
Quite shabby all in all  
Albus couldn’t give away a single,  
Couldn’t give away a book.  
They were read a thousand times

At least.

There are, indeed, so many books:  
They tell a different tale.

Historians are storytellers,  
All they do is writing books.  
And their books tell us a story,  
All their books tell us the same:

They tell us about Gellert,  
Gellert Grindelwald.  
They tell us about evil  
How magic will defeat.

Historians are storytellers,  
All they do is writing books.  
Read their books,  
Believe their books.  
Cause what they write  
Is right.

But historians are humans  
And humans still are flawed.  
And therefore you will notice  
And therefore you will see:

There is no book,  
No single book in Nurmengard.  
Cause Gellert always thought,  
That keeping books from those  
Who should be punished,  
That keeping wisdom,  
Keeping knowledge,  
Keeping stories, love and  
Keeping wit  
From those  
Who should be punished  
Is the most effective,  
Cruel  
Punishment.

There are no books in Nurmengard  
Cause Gellert kept them out.  
There is, indeed, no single book:  
Which could tell a different tale.

Historians are storytellers,  
All they do is writing books.  
And their books tell us a story,  
All their books tell us the same:

They tell us about Gellert,  
Gellert Grindelwald.  
They tell us about evil  
How magic will defeat.

Don’ listen to the cunning,  
Don’t listen to the manifold,  
Don’t listen to the voices of malice!  
Don’t be naive!  
But be prepared!  
And don’t give in,  
And don’t give in  
To tyranny!

Historians are storytellers,  
All they do is writing books.  
Read their books,  
Believe their books.  
Cause what they write  
Is right.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Albus and Gellert teach each over languages and love.

It is summer, the kind of summer you only experience when you are sixteen, seventeen, _beinahe_ eighteen years old and verliebt. Albus and Gellert spend their time sitting in the endless meadows around Godric’s Hollow, _lernend._ Learning about the delight the summer sun causes on the bare skin of their breasts, just before it disappeares behind a cloud for a couple of seconds, leaving not more than a shiver behind. Learning about the subtle meanings of gently touching fingertips: _liebkosend_ at first; a greedy, nearly forceful aftertaste stays, distracts, doesn’t diminish Albus’ feelings at all;   
  
But kindles Albus’ _Leidenschaft._  
  
  
Gellert enjoys being a teacher for Albus, just for Albus; it makes Albus - who equals Gellert in too many aspects - depend on Gellert, Gellert who is the only teacher of love in Godric’s Hollow, far more experienced than Albus, also: a teacher of German. Because that happens to be his native language, and although being fluent in one’s native language isn’t that a great accomplishment – it makes Gellert the expert, it makes Gellert the ruler of the game, it makes Gellert the one who always wins.  
  
 _beinahe, verliebt, lernend, liebkosend, Leidenschaft  
  
almost, in love, learning, carressing, passion_  
  
Albus has learned his vocabulary well. He is an extraordinarily ambitious student; a fast learner. Gellert envies and adores him for his comprehension. With an astounding speeds he grasps new words, new grammatical structures, new sentences.  
  
  
But Gellert doesn’t know that the language Albus wants to learn, needs to learn so desperately isn’t German at all.   
This language’s name is Gellertish, this language’s name is Grindelwaldese. Over the past few weeks he has turned his brain into a dictionary, filled with words, structures, schemes. The Elder Wand, the Peverell brothers, magic and might, but also: _Leidenschaft, Leidenschaft, Leidenschaft,_ the distinctive sounds in Gellert’s voice, his gestures from the raise of a fingertip up to his sweeping steps towards world domination – everything a word, everything a syllable, a phoneme, a semicolon:  
  
Everything: A language.  
  
But yet it happened that Albus discovered a missing word from time to time. There was no real, no right word that described the bond between Albus and Gellert, the passion, the Leidenschaft. Albus added it without a second thought: GREATER GOOD: the only foreign word of Gellertish.  
  
  
  
  
**  
  
By the end of that summer Albus was fluent in Grindelwaldese.  
  
**  
  
  
  
  
In nearly 46 years Albus hadn’t made use of Grindelwaldese once. The language in his brain had faded away like unused knowledge often does, left him with smithereens only. Surprisingly he was surprised when he discovered how little he actually knew.  
  
  
He was even more surprised when he found out that he had no further interest in relearning it: it sounded harsher than he remembered it, less beautiful, more brute.


	7. The Lovers Who Could Have Been

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore and three lovers who could have been

Dead on a tower, the top of the tower, a tower of Hogwarts.

Not dead yet? Don’t worry, or better: worry, cry for dear death: You will die.

In short: It is, very certainly, not the right moment, in fact the worst moment of all, for your foolish craving for first love, Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, do you know that? Do you, as extravagant as you always were, refuse – yet again – to choose the right register (the register of death), to bow to the inevitable?  
Were you – and are you – ignorant of what a – excuse the term – miserable life you lived for a living legend or do you only pretend?

Do you only pretend? That, Albus, is my most challenging fear: Albus Dumbledor, the legend, Albus Dumbledore, the greatest headmaster, Albus Dumbledore, and nothing is true, and nothing is known about you.

Do you remember? Your eyes say: ‘I do’, that’s good, very good, because it’s most important to remember even the tiniest detail and memories are everything. Everything what remains, and at last, silently dies with your last breath, is blown into fresh air, vanishes with you.

You know how much I want you to vanish.

Like you vanished from my mind since I forcefully snatched that first kiss you wanted to spare for a future which never existed. As these days are fading away each minute along with your – not even beautiful – face into an unknown, ultimate darkness, I beg each day for pardon, for all my – if existing – faults, but for the force I put in keeping you, in making you more useful for me, in winning you over to my side. Which is indeed a fault, but one I do not regret.

Do you remember how hard you struggled these days with the thought of giving in to an unknown feeling unique to you and that foreign guy, pulling and pushing you forward into areas unknown to time and space, giving in to the strange rebellion inside your stomach?

‘It is to early’, did you say.

‘It is already to late’, I said.

From then on you flew through history, seemingly forgetting the summer of 1899 with it’s many tears and subtle truths. Glory was on it’s way and inevitable as it was, it poisened the remains of the life you could have lived (with me?).

Then – all of a sudden – you came to bring me to Hogwarts. You promised me a life worthy for a wizard to live, and I’ve got that, no reason for questioning here.

You also promised me a family. Friends. Love in all it’s forms. And you’re eyes were bright as you told me and widely opened. And I could read your mind without using legilimency: It must be like that, being a teacher, it has to be like that. And that made you happy, being a successful teacher, enriching a student's life.

I beg you never realised that you were falling for my dark eyes already back then.

Later on, it was most amusing to see how you couldn’t sleep because of a sudden wave of lust for your most gifted student, and because you feared the dark arts the very same student was more interested in than in anything else.

I see you in the night when foolish Myrtle died, with your wand raised and the words you should have said spilled on the ground and your courage and blindness and first love gone all away.

This night will always remain foggy in the labyrinth of your memories, but the scar shaped like a map of the London underground I left on your limb, right above your knee, will stay.

What if you had said it? What if you had given in a second time? What if you had made me cry, honestly cry for once in my life?

Oh Albus: If you believe you’re doomed to destiny, there is no ‘if’, no choice, no option.

The only person who shed a tear that night was me, you will never know, my friend. I was full of pitty for my poor self that very night, dreaming awful dreams of you and me together knowing that you, Albus, would never fall for someone as dull as I am.

I won’t tell you, because I cried most nights in these years when you send me, day after day, letters in which you told me your most private secrets, in which you confessed your idea of love. Which wasn’t wrong at all in my opinion, except for the fact that you didn’t feel like that for me.

I am the man who lies on a tower, diying not yet.

I am the man who keeps telling you how you will change society for the greater good, while considering exclusively my own, my private, my delicate, little, greater, universal good.

I am the man who provoked your lust so many years ago and who craves for your death, denieing that hatred is a feeling also.

I am the man who will give you the final blow on command, leaving your secrets behind.

I am the man who will press his lips on the scar shaped like the London underground on your dead body, remaining still and stiff inside the coffin, thinking what a heroic strategist you were and how better a man you could have been.

I have once feeled the indescribable feeling for you, but lost it long ago.

It seems clear that I could have never lived to the high opinion you hold of me, but tell me, how can you be sure?

I have longed for your love ever since we were little schoolboys, but lost all my hope during the years.

To put it in a shorter lie: I love you, Albus.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The lovers are Elphias Dodge, Gellert Grindelwald and Tom Riddle, if you didn't notice.


	8. Where Your Treasure Is, There Will Your Heart Be Also

_Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also._  
  
Tell me –  
  
Tell me –   
  
Tell me –  
  
Oh tell me. ‘cause I want to know:  
  
Where is your heart?  
  
Buried deep underground, besides Ignatius Peverell. Buried scarcely an inch, an inch beneath the shallow soil of Godric’s Hollow – Ariana – Kendra – Dumbledore:   
  
_Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also._  
  
Tell me.  
  
Tell me.  
  
Tell me.  
  
Oh tell me. ‘cause I want to know:  
  
Where is your heart?  
  
Forlorn and Forgotten, starving in the dung of fat and sedate goats. Shining throgh the filfiest window. Right into the shadiest of pubs.  
  
 _Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also._  
  
Tell me!  
  
Tell me!  
  
Tell me!  
  
Oh tell me. ‘cause I want to know:  
  
Where is your heart?  
  
Imprisoned, separated from the world, FOR THE GREATER GOOD as everything in Nurmengard. Captured in the fangs of recalled splendidness.  
  
Don’t tell me!  
  
Don’t tell me!  
  
Don’t tell me!  
  
Oh please never tell me. ‘cause I already know:  
  
 _Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also._


	9. A Gifted Generation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is actually meta about being born and growing up in Germany 45 years after the end of WWII and one year after the Berlin wall fell.

Late at night, in June 2008, the last man who ever had the chance to glimpse at Ariana Dumbledore’s beautiful and seldom smile died and all rememblance of the - in his opinion - most deplorable victim of a historic (important, yes! But far away in time and space) reign of terror with him. A person never far away from the multiple centers of attention during multiple periods of recent history; wise enough, though, to never become part of history as his unfortunate brother did. Albus, whom he hated with passion, Albus, who had always reached a wrong decision – but who would care, who would care just one day later, one day in June 2008, who would know what will never be printed in one of those poorly researched history books, who would know what unimportant brothers thought?

No, Aberforth Dumbledore was not the one to tell – but Elphias Dodge was! Elphias Dodge who wrote book after book telling the truth, outselling Rita Skeeter’s by far (which must be a wonder and a sign that what is written in those must be the truth). Albus Dumbledore: heroic as a hero could be. Midsummer’s night in June 2008 was – by accident – also the end of the nice talkative old Elphias on his last trip around the world, arriving at Nurmengard in the glistening sun. He died with a smile on his face knowing well enough how the last person to be imprisoned at the very same place had affected hes heroes ideals. Is it a sin to lie for the sake of a heroic tale? Certainly not, if it’s a good tale.

But it’s 2008! And 2008 is not the year of those old enough to fight in the battles, 2008 is the time that’s the twentyfirst century, a century solely for children and grandchildren and those just not yet born, it’s the time for those born after the defeat, for those who don’t need the evil in their heroic tales because it has already beaten for ever and always by generations before. It’s time of dawn for a gifted generation.

It will be a generation with great opportunities. It will be a generation to explore whole undiscouvered fields of magic. It will be a generation with dramatically increased lifespans due to medic magic. It will be the first generation to install constent muggle relations. It will be a generation which will never loose their husbands and wifes to the fight against all evil. This generation will see lots of great teachers, headmasters, politicians, and – of course – heroes. It will be. That is what Elphias Dodge already knows and that is why he dies smiling.

This generation – and all the ones following – will show only little if any interest in wizarding history and DADA will finally use it’s appeal as a favourite subject. This generation will be the first to visit the recently opened memorial at Nurmengard prison. Soon this class trip will become obligatory and every once in a while the most courageous little boy will run right into Gellert Grindelwald’s cell (there visitors are not allowed to go to) and will make faces in front of his classmates. This generation will be the first one to see all the new memorials around Hogwart’s castle reminding them of the boy who lived and of the greates headmaster of all times. It will also be the first generation to put graffiti of the dark mark (to impress their classmates) on those memorials. This generation will listen to the speechs of the great Harry Potter, finding them so different and exotic, as if he was a youth in the middle ages and not merely a few years ago. This generation will be a generation to believe in the good and to declare the fight against all evil finally over and won.

They will have to read many history books during their lessons and they will think that they have read them far too often, because they already know enough. They will see numerous pictures of Gellert Grindelwald and they will think that they already know how he was like, and that they would never give in to a person like this, that they would have been heroes, that they would have fought, but regardless of what they think, they will never, ever be capable of understanding how it felt to be smirked at by Gellert Grindelwald with his insane lust for blood, how it felt like before he was going to kill you, how perfectly whole, inspired and vivid you could feel the moment he leered at you with a completely different kind of lust. Little will they know about how their heroes (and they will always be heroes just waiting to save them!) were never heroes, because no human could be. Little did they know about how the evil could create an affection which is, in it’s nature, not evil at all. It will be the generation ‘All was well’.

By no means will it be a special generation. But it will be the only one to tell new stories about!


	10. Clouds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If 'blaue Blume' is unfamiliar to you, you can look up 'blue flower' on wikipedia.

After a burial remaining family members are left with a foggy feeling. Before noon, fog disappears into nothingness. If you can’t find the clock (because there is fog!) – how do you know when noon is?  
  
Isn’t summer the noon of a year?  
  
Clear, blue skies: You’ll never notice with your eyes still as the fog! Those fallen for sorrow will neverlook up – the doublet, you glorious two! You do!  
  
the Blue – the Sun – the Dazzle  
  
Flying up high, would you depict the fog? Back down? There is fog on the ground, but oh! The sky, it has no ground.  
  
Blue is for craving, _blaue Blume_ , Sun is for shining, wind is for moving, first white cloud at the horizon is for – indeed it should not be seen or even; grow  
  
Flying up high, into the sky, would you present the clouds attention? I’d say: no one would! As long, as there is blue enough for both of us as long as the shivering can be mistaken for your lust, as long as there’s a chance to fly higher, to look from the sky, upon the clouds, with more than just pride gleeming in your eyes: You wouldn’t.  
  
Clouds are beasty, clouds are grey, clouds are never more than a surprisingly watery flimsiness. The same clouds they flew through barely noticing finally caused the thunderstorm.  
  
During the thunderstorm, the last glimpse of blue;  
  
Your piercing eyes so full of longing, still!  
  
Is the one who brought you away from the fog and showed you the sky to blame for – clouds?


	11. A Matter of Perception

“Gellert, do you love me?”  
“That is a matter of perception”  
  
“If so, how do you want to love me?”  
“In a manner of perfection.”  
  
But in summer light, everything appears so bright, but in summer light, but in summer light! In summer light everything appears so bright.  
  
Is that beautiful? Albus asks himself. Is that beautiful and how do you tell he asks himself and how do you tell?   
  
His lover’s golden curls – Beautiful! Beautiful!  
Nighttime kisses, imaginary only, for owls bring hardly dried ink and nothing more – A scent of beauty yet to come, the odour of tomorrow!  
A girl’s corpse. Cheeks still coloured raspberry rose. Ephemeral, this is the beauty of yesterday!   
  
Immortal beauty – what a dream! Immortal beauty – what perfection!   
  
Immortal beauty – Gellert’s beauty – the beauty of tomorrow.  
  
“Malice really is no matter of perception.”  
“Love is.”  
  
Ask me one last question! Summer always ends with a question mark.  
  
“How do you want to die?”  
“In a manner of perfection.”


	12. A Victor's Praise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 100-word-drabble

Having picked up the elder wand with trembling, wrinkled fingers, Albus vainly aims for a celebratory gesture. _Legilimens!_ A spell escapes his lungs, barely murmured, accompanied by a flush of dry, cold northern air. He holds the wand like a dagger, and –   
  
_Juvenile fingers run through another boy’s hair, so much hair so glistening in so much sunlight, virulent ideas infatuate their minds, their magic, fill their bodies, fill and fill and fill and supersede. A swarm of fervent birds just leaves the place, heading south, for Italy, for Greece._  
  
– it points at Albus’ very own chest.


	13. Map of Kisses

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 100-word drabble

Gellert conqueres Albus’ mind with words; with kisses he conqueres Albus’ body. He places love-bites on claimed territory. This colonisation alters the landscape of his skin, blue lakes appear, their borders change, a week later they begin to sear. Gellert sets red blazing fires on pale student’s skin, when Albus blushes, when Gellert convinces him to spend a full day in the sun, when Gellert kisses him greedily.  
Seldom Albus kisses back. Once he gently kisses Gellert’s fingertips, his nails, once his golden hair.

Years later the love-bites have faded long since. Albus’ soft lips continue to haunt Gellert’s dreams.


End file.
